


Dwarf

by This_Fandom_Life



Category: Starship Promise (Visual Novel)
Genre: Abandonment, Eventual Antares/reader, Explicit Language, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Honestly who knows., Implied/Referenced Character Death, maybe some angst?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-11
Updated: 2019-09-11
Packaged: 2020-11-02 03:00:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20598980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/This_Fandom_Life/pseuds/This_Fandom_Life
Summary: After tragedy strikes home, can the reader leave all she knows behind, to finally take down the people who killed her family?When she saves the life of an officer and he takes her in, anything may be possible. On her path of vengeance, she'll learn who and how to love, trust, and survive.





	Dwarf

**Author's Note:**

> Hi Hi!  
First fic in a while will try to update regularly.  
As always though:  
I do not own any characters mentioned in the Starship Promise (Visual Novel). The reader and several other future characters will be purely mine and mine alone.  
Some of this work will be italicised, and unless it is bolded as well they will all be internal thoughts.
> 
> With out further ado,  
Enjoy!

Prologue

My name is y/n y/l/n. I live with my parents on Solaris VII, when I'm not at the academy. I'm a cadet at the Union Flight Academy. I'm a very skilled pilot, second only to my best friend Miya's brother Atlas, but I'm also trained in long range blaster combat, but also hand to hand and saber combat. This is great and all, it makes me the perfect Union soldier. And I know I should be happy, I'm set to graduate early and I'll be deployed immediately, which is everything I've always wanted. But, after finding some information on some testing the Union has been doing, I'm not so sure. 

We've all had our suspicions and there have always been rumors, but there's never been proof. Not until...Mom. My mom was a very well respected scientist and engineer. And she found out about a series of secret bioweapons that the Union had been testing on the colony. When Union soldiers started bringing in unconscious civilians and asking her to run tests on them, my mom started to get suspicious. Aside from being completely unconscious the people were unrelated. They had nothing in common, so why were so many of them coming in with the same condition? She ran all sorts of tests and reports and came to the conclusion that they had been introduced to a sedative of some sort. Once she narrowed it down to a particular strand she brought it up with her superiors and they refused to acknowledge the concerns. Then it got worse. All the people being brought in to this point were able to be revived at some point. But the next wave of civilians couldn't be revived. They were all pronounced brain dead. The strand in their bodies was similar, but it was almost as if it had evolved. it was so much larger and complex than before. Again, she brought it up with her superiors and they waived her off.

Then they started dying. The civilians started dying in transport, on the way to my mothers lab. Once that started happening, my mother collected all of her data and demanded answers from her superiors. They told her that if she didn't shut her mouth and keep quiet, she'd be next. They were right. I'm finishing my years here at the academy and have been called home a week early. I said goodbye to Atlas and told him to give Miya a hug for me.

When I got home, my father gave me a hug and kissed the crown of my head, before releasing me to let me get settled. Until I hear him calling me into the living room. "Hey dad. What's up?" I looked around and noticed mom was no where to be seen, "Where's mom?"

My dad took a deep breath and met my eyes. "She's dead."

"What?" I felt my world stop. I wanted him to say psych, to tell me April fools and laugh. I wanted anything to happen that could prove him wrong. My dad didn't say anything else, he just watched my face, watching as my brain slowly put all the pieces together. Mom's cardigan isn't thrown over the back of the armchair. Her boots aren't kicked off by the front door. "I-" The sob wrenching its why through my body cut me off. I took a few deep breaths in an attempt to speak again. "What happened, Dad?" 

"Honestly, baby girl, I don't know. Some Union officers came by and said there was a lab accident. They said they found a woman with no identification and ask me if I could come in to identify the body." I didn't let him finish. I just ran to him and flung myself into his arms, when he held them open. I sobbed, violent sobs and cried into his shoulder. "It's gonna be okay, baby girl. I'm still here. Dad is still here." He held me close and rubbed my back. I gulped down some air and pulled away.

"I'm gonna go see Miya, Dad." I looked him in the eye and he nodded.

"She is like another daughter and a sister to you, she deserves to know too." I wiped away the remaining tears and went upstairs to grab a couple changes of clothes. I slid my personal blaster into its holster and slid the saber into the one next to it. I took a last look around my room to see if there's anything else I might need. When I go over to Miya's, no one knows how long I'll be there. Going downstairs, I gave my dad a hug and a kiss on the cheek and left.

Once I'm at Miya's, she immediately lets me in. We go up to her room and sit on her bed a moment before I open my mouth to speak, "Miya, something happened."

She nods and takes my hands in hers. "I know. "Atlas called me and said you were sent home early, he didn't say why though."

"I know. He doesn't know why. I didn't find out why until I got home." I'm about to tell her, when my eyes catch my reflection. I gasp at how much I look like her. The same y/e/c eyes, the same long y/h/c hair. Tears start rolling down my cheeks and I don't notice I'm crying until I realize that Miya has gone and gotten her personal communicator. It's then that I snap out of it, upon hearing Atlas' voice of concern. 

"Miya? What's wrong?" Miya lifts her comm up and points the face camera at me. Atlas appears to notice the tears and zeros in on my face. "Y/n, what happened?"

I clutch the sheets in hand and I sigh. "She's dead." I watch both Miya and Atlas' faces drop upon hearing my words.

"Who, babe? Who's dead?" Miya leans in, asking. 

"Mom." Their mutual gasp is the only thing I hear before breaking into sobs again. "Mom's dead. She's gone and she'll never be coming back."

"What? What happened? She was fine when she called you at academy a couple days ago?" Atlas is shaken, but he's not crying like Miya is. 

"I don't know. Dad didn't say. J-just that there was a lab accident." Atlas' brow furrows, but he doesn't say anything. He's quiet a moment, staring at something past the camera. "Y/n, turn on the tv. You need to see this."

I frown and Miya turns on the tv in her room. A news anchor immediately appears on screen showing a house on fire. It takes me a moment before I realize it's my house. The anchor is telling how the Union was testing some new air purifier and when the truck with the tank of gas drove by this one house, it combusted. "The rescue workers that have gone inside the house have said that there was one person inside and they were to late to save them."

"Houses don't just spontaneously combust." I heard Atlas, but I was far away. In less than 24 hours, I had lost both of my parents. I jumped of the bed, grabbed my things and ran.

"Atlas! I'll call you back." I can hear Miya running after me telling me to wait, but I can't. I can't wait. With tears streaming down my face, I just keep running. I don't know where I'm running, but I am. And I don't stop for anyone or anything.

_What in the actual fuck._

A while later, I'm standing on the tarmac watching all the aircrafts go by. When I stopped running, I realized I had come to my safe place. Here, on the tarmac I feel at ease, like I can breathe, like I can think. I can be in control of everything here. I don't know how long I plan on being here. I don't know anything any more. I'm tired. I'm upset. My legs are burning. I fall to my knees where I am and scream. As loud as I can, not caring who hears me. _I probably look insane. Who cares? I don't have any more family, I have no home, I have nothing. I have Miya and Atlas. And I have the Academy. _I scoff and laugh to myself. _The Academy. I can only assume the Union is the reason why I'm an orphan now. Mom's accident, after finding out something she shouldn't have. Dad being trapped inside a burning house, that had been fine an hour prior. and because of an 'air purifier'. They can't honestly expect me to believe that._

_No matter how good of a soldier I may be for them. I'm not stupid._

_ But, that didn’t happen. That didn’t actually happen. Right? __All of this is just a REALLY awful joke right? __There’s just something in the colony air. I must be hallucinating. The Union's 'air purifier' must have been in use at the academy. Yeah... I'm making all of this up in my head. That's gotta be it. Because it’s definitely getting colder and there’s that weird noise. Wait. There was no noise when I first got here. _I shake myself from my reverie to try and get my wits about me. Looking around, it looks like your average colony tarmac. _But that noise..._ All the space ships are average. There are a few passenger ships, some Union fighters, and two small personal flyers, but nothing abnormal. _That noise.. It's getting closer. I have to figure out where it's coming from._ My heart rate is slowing down as I force my brain to focus. _Freak out later, y/n. Right now you might be in trouble and you need to figure out why. _I try looking around again. The starships are fine, the tarmac is fine, the people..._THE PEOPLE! Where are the people?! _The tarmac is barren, except for the dot on the far side, against the cityscape._ Wait, is the dot getting bigger? _With the distant dot and the strange noise both growing more prominent, I start to worry. Whoever or whatever this thing is, it poses a possible threat. I do the first thing that comes to mind. 

I pull out my blaster and hide behind a mountain of crates. After a moment, I see that the dot is no longer a dot and is actually a person, or rather people. One person being chased by other people. A lot of other people. It dawns on my that the noise I've been hearing is the sound of boots on the ground with some rouge blaster shots peppered in. A man in a heavily decorated black suit of armor, comes full focus first. _He's definitely not Union. Empire, maybe?_ But there's something about his armor that refuses to be forgotten. Well not his armor. It was his skin, a dark, ashen gray color; his face was stern and unrecognizable, almost as if it was a permanent scowl that would shatter at the mere glimpse of a smile. He was being chased by a sharp dressed man in a crisp white Union uniform and a small squadron of soldiers. I didn’t want to get hurt in the possible crossfire, but he obviously needed help.

“Commodore Fox, I order you to halt!” The gray man stopped and searched the hangar, possibly looking for a getaway ship. “Halt!” When the man in the white suit finally catches up with him, I take my chance at the lagging squad behind him. I turn off the safety on my blaster and take aim at the soldier closest to me. I set the charge to medium and fired. He clutched at his shoulder as he fell to the ground. I quickly take aim at the two behind him, who were scanning the area, trying to figure out who took out their comrade.

Sparing a glance at the gray man, I noticed him fighting saber to saber with the white suited man. “Come on, Admiral. Surely you can put up more of a fight than that.” They were just barely within earshot. I turn my focus back to the squad and take out the two I had set my focus on initially. They both fell to their knees groaning, before collapsing into a heap on the floor. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the man named Fox, glance in my general direction, while not long enough for white suited man to notice, it was long enough for Fox to falter and give the white suited man a slight upper hand. I suppress a small gasp when his beam saber grazes the sleeve of Fox’s armor, tarnishing the intricate gold pattern.

_Focus, y/n, you have work to do._ And I do. I quickly regroup my thoughts and realign my sights. I take out the one closest to me and he crumbles down. It goes on for a minute like this before some of the soldiers start to wonder who is dwindling their numbers when the commodore is so busy. They start stalking over towards my hiding spot and I think of my next course of action. _I could just shoot them before they get close enough._ I weigh this as an option for a moment._ But then I’d have the attention of the entire squad and possibly the Admiral. _I huff in frustration. _Or, instead of being an idiot and pulling scenes out of one of those Marvel movies I watched with dad, I could just find a new hiding space. _I decide to go with my latter option after scolding myself.

Scanning the holding bay, I notice a couple more ships. One was a Cargo ship, that they used to transport food and goods to the colony and the other two were warships. One a very sleek, very modern ship and the other a rather square, boxy ship. The cargo ship looked like it’d be the best of the three to hide out in, but something was pulling me towards the sleek one. Knowing me it probably had some sort of attraction tech and was pulling me in but ignoring my knack for extreme luck I chose the boxy one, noting that its massive wings had smallish tips. _Big enough that I could hide behind? _I kick over some boards propped on my right and dive to my left. I just barely cover behind the closest wing tip when what’s left of the squadron are approaching the crates I was just behind. I spare another glance at Fox and see he’s regained the upper hand. I take out the last of the squad and decide to just enjoy the show.

“Be done with this foolishness, Admiral. You’ll never be able to stop the Galactic Liberation Front.” Fox had noticed the lack of soldiers and seemed to visibly relax and take note of the fact that I had taken care of the rest.

“Bullshit, Fox. You know the Union will never hesitate to obliterate you rebellious, empire scum. Your armies might be better equipped, but we have strength in numbers you can’t even begin to fathom.” The admiral had a look on his face that was so serious I couldn’t help it. I barked out a laugh. _Oh fuck. _It’s too late to hide as the Admiral turns towards my direction. “You! Show yourself!”

Still laughing I stand with my blaster raised. My laughter fades and a false sense of bravado fills me. The commodore hasn’t turned around, beam saber still at the ready, gaze unwavering from the Admiral. _We must look so bad ass, oh my stars. _“The union is going to take us down?” I pause for effect, before jumping off the wing and hitting my feet. Raising slowly, I steel my eyes with his, “You and what army?”

As if that broke him from his spell, he turns and gasps at all the bodies littering the floor. “You killed them all?” His tone was a mix of horror, surprise, and amusement. I laughed again.

“I’m not a Union murder Admiral. Well, Union, yes technically, but not a murderer. They’re all unconscious, but they’ll come to once their wounds are addressed.” I shift my focus to the Commodore who has stayed silent. “You’re move, Commodore Fox.”  


The commodore stands still, unmoving and quiet. He slowly walks back a few feet, without removing his gaze from his offender. Once he’s within range, he throws a look over his shoulder and lowers his voice so that only I can hear him, “Take him out, but don’t kill him. He doesn’t need to die.” He looks back at the admiral. “Not yet, anyway.”

“Sir, yes sir.” I switched the charge on my blaster down to low, lined up my sights, and before he had a chance to protest, fired a shot directly at his head. I flipped the blaster charge down to zero and turned the safety to holster it as the commodore walked over to the admiral.

“Stars child, I said don’t kill him.” I glanced up at him, once I had gotten myself put back together.

"I didn’t kill him," I started towards the men, "like the others, he'll come to in a bit, once his wounds have been seen to. But," sucking in a large breath and exhaling loudly before continuing, "I shot him in the head. So he will most likely not be waking up on his own before care."

The commodore went quiet and nodded. He sized me up and I refused to look away once he met my eyes. _What the fuck is this guys deal? I wonder if he knows that not everyone is out to get him. _He looked me over once more before speaking. "What's your name child?"

"It's Y/F/N Y/L/N and you are?"

"I am Galactic Liberation Front Commodore Tyberius Fox. How old are you?"

"I'm 17, the youngest cadet at the Union Flight Academy." His eyes gleamed with what I can only assume is surprise and was more than likely getting ready to continue with his round of questions when I followed up, "I no longer have any family, my father taught me to shoot when I became a teenager for self defense, I like giving orders instead of taking them, and I've never taken a walk on a beach, but I assume it's a very nice experience." I shifted my weight to one foot and glanced around the tarmac. We've been talking for a moment and while I am a Union Cadet, I don't think it'd be beneficial to be seen talking to each other.

When I turn my attention back towards him, he's smirking. _Holy hubble, the man can smile. _"How would you feel about switching sides and joining the Galactic Liberation Front?"

"Ugh, I don't know, that's a really long name." I stretched out the words and rolled my head around for emphasis. "But then again, do I get a cool uniform like that? Ya know, One that doesn't make me look like a marshmallow?"

He chuckled and shook his head, "As for the name, it can be shortened into what I assume you know is the Empire. But for your uniform, it wouldn't be exactly like this one no, but with a little bit of red and some gold accents here and there. So you would not look like a marshmallow."

I pretended to mull it over a bit. "I dunno. What else can you offer me?" The commodore was quiet and didn't offer anything else. I sighed and looked away, thinking about how my life was going prior to this whole event. Looking back to the commodore once more I cleared my throat before continuing, "Answer me this one question and I'll join your club." I paused and the commodore motioned with his hands to continue. I swallowed the invisible knot in my throat and stared directly into his eyes, which I'm coming to notice are a deep red like a garnet. "Can I rely on you, during my transition?" He seemed to take a moment so I opened my mouth to clarify and he held up his hand. I looked at it with disdain, since I had already told him that I did not like to take orders.

"I will," he thought over his next words a moment, "however, I will not be your babysitter and I will not coddle you. You will be my student and I your mentor at most. You will be a soldier and I your superior officer at least. Do I make myself clear?" 

_I'm doing this. I can't be an accessory to the people who killed my family. I'll destroy them. By joining forces with their enemy. _

The enemy of my enemy, is my friend.

So I nod, hold a hand to my forehead, and take it away in mock salute. "Sir, yes sir."

He smirks once more before saying, "Long live the Empire." He turns and starts walking towards the modern ship I had seen earlier.

I start to follow and before boarding, I stop and take one last look behind me at the colony I once called home. _Goodbye Miya, Atlas. I'll love and miss you both. _Taking a deep breath, I exhale and turn to meet the commodore's gaze. 

"Long live the Empire."

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you all enjoyed!  
As always, thank you all for reading.  
Comments, Kudos, and DMs are all appreciated and all forms of critisicim are welcomed.  
As I update more, I hope to be on more of a schedule, but we'll see how this pans out :)


End file.
